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Who is Zoom on The Flash? The most likely theories.

So I didn’t get time to write a post about the last Flash episode, but I did want to discuss a little about Zoom. Up until recently we haven’t seen too much of Zoom, but now that we have a greater sense of who he is, it’s time to starting theorising on his true identity.

Spoilers for The Flash season 2 follow!

Last season we spent a little while trying to figure out who the man in yellow was. For the comic readers out there things got confusing when they introduced Eddie Thawne and not the other Thawne we all knew. Eventually we found out that Harrison Wells isn’t Harrison Wells but indeed Eobard Thawne! And his origin story was changed a lot from the comics.

From that it’s hard to figure out who Zoom is in this season. It’s easy to say, well it must be the other prominent Reverse Flash, Hunter Zolomon. Yes in the comics the character called Zoom is Hunter Zolomon but considering this show doesn’t really follow the comics too closely, that’s probably not going to be the case.

Also Hunter Zolomon is a character that is attached to Wally West’s Flash. Hunter Zolomon was Wally’s friend, and thought to make Wally a better Flash he needed more tragedy in his life, like the previous Flash Barry Allen. So Hunter decided to make that tragedy for Wally.

So using Hunter in that sense doesn’t really work for the show. Barry isn’t Wally, and has already been through a lot of tragedy, he doesn’t need Hunter creating more for him.

And with the latest appearance of Zoom there’s been some major theories coming out surrounding who Zoom may be:

1. Earth-2 Barry Allen: My personal favourite theory, this theory suggests that Zoom is in fact Earth-2’s Barry Allen. A lot of people have considered that Zoom is The Flash, and it would make sense. There have been a number of parallels between Barry and Zoom set up already. The characters on the show continue to talk about how fast Barry is. Jay made the point that Barry is even faster than him. Zoom comes in and has a speed to match, and even beat Barry.If anyone has a speed like Zoom’s, it would make sense for it to be another Barry Allen. Then you have the whole evil doppleganger thing being a prominent plot point this season. We saw in the beginning, random Central City citizens having evil Earth-2 counterparts. Linda herself has an evil Earth-2 counterpart in the form of Dr. Light. So once again, this theme could easily be carried over to Barry.

2. Henry Allen: This theory really started when a photo of Zoom was released, and he seemed to have eyes very similar to that of Henry Allen. Now for all we know that could have just been a stunt actor in that suit, but it did look a lot like Henry Allen. I can’t imagine them making Barry’s dad from Earth-1 evil (that would just be incredibly rude) so if this is the case it’s probably Earth-2 Henry Allen. Perhaps Barry Allen doesn’t even exist on Earth-2, the only Allen left may be Henry. Remember we heard that on Earth-2 Oliver Queen wasn’t the Green Arrow, his dad was. So perhaps they will continue this idea to Zoom, with Henry Allen being the Speedster, not Barry.

They’ve been a bit weird with Henry Allen’s character on The Flash this season. They release him from jail, just to send him away for really flaky reasons. He returns this week, and it’s coincidentally the same time things with Zoom have really started to heat up. So maybe there is a connection there. I mean Harrison Wells was Barry’s father figure last year and he was evil, maybe they want to continue that. But it would seem a little overused. It would obviously have a lot more emotional impact if they made it Henry Allen from Earth-1, but it’d just be too much of a leap to make Earth-1 Henry evil.

3. Eobard Thawne…again: We know that on Earth-1 Eobard Thawne killed Harrison Wells and became him. Earth-2 Harrison Wells is actually Harrison Wells, so the question is does Eobard Thawne exist on Earth-2 as well? If he does it would make sense for him to be Zoom. However although logical, it’s boring. From a storytelling point-of-view, it’s uninspiring to use Thawne again. Maybe if this was season 5 and the last time we saw Thawne was back in season 1, it could have been cool to bring that character back. But we just saw Thawne, no need to use him again so soon.

4. Eddie Thawne: For a long time many of us thought (me included) that surely Eddie must be some kind of Reverse Flash. But he wasn’t, and ended up sacrificing himself to save everyone. However people are apparently not keen to let him go, and suggest that he could be Zoom. Whether this is the Earth-1 or Earth-2 Eddie, I don’t know. Either way I highly doubt it.Eddie is like the Tommy from Arrow. He was a character we connected to in season 1 who got taken away early, and is never going to return again. Arrow likes to bring back everyone from the dead these days, but it seems like the one character they won’t ever touch is Tommy. And I think the same can be said for Eddie. Let’s remember him as the guy we thought was evil but ended up being the ultimate hero. No need to tarnish that.

Because Zoom’s identity has been so tight-lipped it only makes sense for it to be a character that we already know. It wouldn’t make sense for Zoom to take off his mask and it’s “Johnny Lee”, some random guy with no connection to anyone or anything! Zoom’s reveal will be big and will be dramatic.

The Flash is often an emotional show and likes to explore the complex dynamics of relationships. How they make us who we are. How relationships can bring the most pain in our lives, but also the most joy. Relationships is an integral part of the show, and so is Barry’s reflection of himself. He’s had his ups and downs, and sometimes loses himself with his life as The Flash. And it’s these things that suggest to me that the theories above are the most viable.

Now of course it could be none of those theories, which is very possible considering I’m often left very surprised with what The Flash does. But I would hope that Zoom has some personal connection to Barry in one way or another.

Right now Zoom is proving to be an incredibly terrifying villain. He doesn’t like to waste time, he likes to make a point. A point which he proved pretty nicely last episode. He is stronger, faster and smarter than Barry right now. He left Barry a cripple and waved his weakened opponent around for everyone to see. I’m definitely looking forward to finding out more on Zoom’s back story and motivations, we’re in for a good season of The Flash!

I’ve enjoyed reading your reviews too. I’m always excited to hear what you have to say on stuff like this.

It’s funny that you mention that Barry isn’t Wally, yet DC, at least in regards to recent comics, shows differently. They’ve been treating Barry like a blank slate since The New 52, though not so much since he came back from the dead up til New 52. It made sense to bench Wally while Barry became Flash again, since Wally had been doing it for more than 2 decades and now has a family. Originally it was supposed to be like how Hal Jordan came back to life, but with Barry Allen. Then New 52 happened, Barry is the only Flash, and Wally came back but as a bitter hollow shell of his former self everyone knew and loved. Barry in the comics right now has a lot of Wally’s elements such as personality, social life, and even some of Wally’s enemies. And the show does this too, though more understandable since it’s a younger Barry learning the ropes (not to mention Professor Zoom did time-travel shenanigans so that changed things too). Thing is, I think the show is doing a better job of bringing Barry to modern times than the comics are right now. All the comics need now is a Flash-equivalent to what Jeff Lemire did for Green Arrow while that comic sucked until he came along :) .

As for Zoom, I think he’s Barry from Earth 2. From what I’ve heard and looked up, he’s probably a reimagining of a villain named Pollux from the 1990 show, who was a clone of Barry and wore a blue Flash suit. Makes sense that way, though I hope the show utilizes Hunter Zolomon at some point.

I’m going to disagree with it being Barry of Earth-2. I doubt he would hide his face if he was E2 Barry. The pain that would be caused knowing this alternate universe version of himself descended into madness would be more traumatic than any physical pain he could ever receive.

It’s more likely that Zoom is Eddie Thawne from Earth-1. When you consider that at the time of his death and absorption into the singularity, he was wearing the Thawne family talisman, which is essentially the show’s version of the talisman which transforms Malcolm Thawne into Cobalt Blue and allows him to STEAL SPEED from other speedsters. In addition, he was thrown into the singularity with plates from Eobard’s TIME SPHERE that were covered in a COBALT resin. It’s entirely possible that the talisman mixed with the singularity resurrected Eddie and threw him backwards in time through the breach to Earth-2.

I think all of these things and how a lot of them came about in the season one finale isn’t just an easter egg towards Cobalt Blue. Zoom has the face of death, Eddie faced death. Zoom also has a line in “Enter Zoom” where he says “You too, weren’t fast enough.” While the “you too” is clearly towards Jay Garrick, I think there is a deeper meaning when he says it to Barry. Zoom is Eddie and Eddie blames Barry for his death, because he was not fast enough to defeat Eobard Thawne without Eddie’s intervention.

Aww thanks so much!
Yeah I’ve started giving up on the recent Flash comics, they really need a new creative team. I like the way the show has been handling Barry and I hope that when Wally comes in, he’s a bit more of the original Wally.
Hmm haven’t heard of Pollux, if this isn’t Hunter then I think for sure down the line they will use him

Here’s where I will disagree with some of your comments. First and foremost, Eddie Thawne is definitely not the Tommy Merlyn of The Flash. He is the Malcolm Thawne of The Flash. There are greater plans for the character and I’m promising you right now that those plans include him being Zoom.

A lot of evidence can be used to support Eddie being Zoom. From the Thawne family talisman around his neck which in the comics is a talisman that ends up turning him into Cobalt Blue, being sucked into a giant whole in the space-time continuum alongside COBALT resin covered plates from a time machine, Zoom’s dialogue in regards to “heroes die,” how Zoom knows about Barry Allen’s personal life, the fact Zoom’s suit is essentially a black hybrid of both Barry Allen’s Flash suit and Eobard Thawne’s Reverse-Flash suit and not a black version of Jay Garrick’s (despite APPARENTLY being from that same Earth.)

What evidence is there to support the theory of Earth-2 Barry Allen or Henry Allen? The fact E2 metahumans have been trying to kill their doppelgangers? Outside of that, there is very little reason to believe that it’s one of those characters from Earth-2.

It would make sense for that to happen with Eddie, it’s just the way they sent him out I wouldn’t think they would want to turn him into the villain. Although the show does like to keep the audience constantly surprised, so it wouldn’t be that far off if Zoom was Eddie. But yeah you bring up a lot of interesting points, I’ll be keeping my eye out for more Eddie/Zoom clues in the next few episodes

Jay mentioned Zoom and him were enemies for yrs and the singularity opened during one of their fights and that’s how Team Flash got his hat. The singularity didn’t open until right when Eddie died so he couldn’t be Zoom if Jay had been fighting him for a while.

Plus Earth 2 Harrison Wells said he created Zoom and knows everything about him. So does that mean he knows Zoom’s name? If so, you’d think he’d reveal it, but then again knowing the history of Arrowverse and especially Harrison Wells, there’s ALWAYS secrets that blow up in ppl’s faces.

Also, bit of a side-note, but I think it’s pretty clear that Eobard Thawne is the cause of the Arrowverse. He travels back in time to kill Barry to prevent The Flash for unknown reasons other than hatred, kills his mom instead, and changes the time line where he loses his speed and has to get Flash his powers early. But knowing how complicated time-travel can be in other stories and that it’s compared to rivers, there were ripple effects. For example, Thawne said Oliver died at 86, but what if that was a previous version? What if Oliver became Green Arrow by different circumstances other than what happened over the course of Arrow so far? Or Ronnie Raymond is still Firestorm (he’s probably still alive; yeah I know I’m beating a dead horse with that)? There probably wouldn’t even be this conflict with Zoom if Thawne hadn’t done what he did. So, in short, Thawne is the instigator of almost everything in the Arrowverse and Zoom is the fallout of those actions.

I can totally imagine them revealing that Wells has known the whole time, considering how much they love characters hiding dumb secrets on the show.
And yeah like this timeline is essentially an alternate timeline, because Barry’s mother wasn’t supposed to die. Everything is just a knock-on effect of what Thawne did

I’m going to go out on a limb and say it could very well be…Wally West from Earth 2. It makes sense that he’d get some family time, of course, but I can’t help but feel that its mighty convenient how he’s getting so much screen time ever since the midseason premiere. Might be to build up a strong connection with audiences and then we’d see what would happen if he didn’t have a guiding influence in the form of Joe, or if his mother never got over her drug issues…

And I think they may have hinted at it slightly in ‘Fast Lane’ – he gave that pretty impassioned speech about being addicted to the feeling of going fast. Weak connection, admittedly, but Zoom wants to be the fastest person ever, so…

Hmm maybe, I don’t know if they would do that just yet, because we only just met Wally’s character, so I doubt feel like it would be as dramatic if it was him from Earth-2, because we barely know Earth-1 Wally yet

I have a really weird theory that I’ve only seen one blogger propose already. I don’t have much doubt from the pics that have been released and the weird way Henry Allen took off in the first episode of season 2 that the actor (Shipp) is going be playing the person who Zoom ends up being. I also believe the mention of Oliver Queen’s dad being the Green Arrow on the Earth 2 newscast is a planted foreshadowing of this.

There was a 1990’s Flash TV show on CBS starring Shipp as Barry Allen. It’s also been revealed that the CW’s Flash is going to make an appearance on Supergirl later this year, which is on CBS. I believe they cited Barry’s ability to travel to other dimensions as the cause of the crossover. What if Zoom is the Barry Allen from the 1990’s show, and what if Earth 1 is the CW and Earth 2 is CBS? It’s crazy, I know. Or possibly CBS is Earth 3 and Zoom travelled to Earth 2 first to mess with Jay Garrick, and that’s why Barry will eventually have to visit Supergirl.

Obviously this is just theorizing. I have no clue. I will say this– Eobard Thawne is wrapped up in it. I don’t believe for one second he confessed to killing Nora Allen just to be nice to his mortal enemy. This goes especially since he would have had to have recorded the video before his final fight with Barry at the end of season 1, and during that fight he didn’t seem so nice when he was threatening to kill everyone Barry knows. Perhaps it was a revenge plan for if things went wrong. He would have known that Zoom could take the place of Henry Allen, and his confession to get Henry Allen out of prison was part of the plan. If Eobard Thawne was really obsessed with Flash, it’s conceivable that he could have already travelled to the universe where Ship was the Flash/Zoom and known of his likeness to Henry Allen.

Wow interesting theory haha. I don’t know if they’ll tie in the old Flash show because it might get too confusing for the general audience. It would be interesting if this whole this was still part of Eobard’s plan, but because of that recent episode with him it seemed like they were done with him for a while, but you never know with this show.
And yeah Supergirl is going to be a different Earth, not Earth-2 but a different Earth.